


About Today

by ClaraxBarton



Category: Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Avengers - Freeform, Clint Needs a Hug, Hawkeye - Freeform, M/M, and a clue, winter soldier - Freeform, winterhawk - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-30
Updated: 2018-12-30
Packaged: 2019-09-30 07:56:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,753
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17219975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ClaraxBarton/pseuds/ClaraxBarton
Summary: The thing is, Clint is fine.He is.Really.All things considered, yeah, sure, he’s a little fucked up.But who wouldn’t be?He’d helped an alien god invade Earth, and been responsible for thousands of deaths and billions of dollars in property damage.He’d had his fucking mind controlled by a shiny rock thing.He’d fought robots on a flying city.He’d found out that his decade-long career of being a white hat was actually a decade of him being an agent for HYDRA.And that was just the shit from the last three years.But he was fine.One-hundred percent dealing with shit. Or at least avoiding it.Until James “Bucky” Fucking Barnes came into the picture.





	About Today

**Author's Note:**

  * For [USSFriendship](https://archiveofourown.org/users/USSFriendship/gifts).



> As always, thanks to Ro for saving me from myself. You are the best beta and such a damn good friend.
> 
> Wrote this for USSFriendship and I hope it makes the rough few weeks a little easier to put behind you.
> 
>  
> 
> \--

The thing is, Clint is  _ fine _ .

 

He is.

 

Really.

 

All things considered, yeah, sure, he’s a little fucked up.

 

But who  _ wouldn’t _ be?

 

He’d helped an alien  _ god _ invade Earth, and been responsible for thousands of deaths and billions of dollars in property damage.

 

He’d had his fucking  _ mind _ controlled by a shiny rock thing.

 

He’d fought robots on a flying city.

 

He’d found out that his decade-long career of being a white hat was actually a decade of him being an agent for HYDRA.

 

And that was just the shit from the last  _ three years _ .

 

So, no, he wasn’t, like… sleeping through the night, any night. And maybe every time he saw a flash of blue light - and in NYC, that was pretty fucking often - he got tense and had to work real damn hard to regulate his breathing. And maybe he still had… What had Bobbi called it?  _ An overwhelming self-hatred and need to self-sabotage every good moment of his life _ . Or something like that.

 

But he was  _ fine _ .

 

One-hundred percent dealing with shit. Or at least avoiding it.

 

Until James “Bucky” Fucking Barnes came into the picture.

 

Sure, Clint was happy that Cap had his long-lost best friend back. Who wouldn’t be?

 

And yeah,  _ of course _ Clint was happy there was another member of the former brainwashed assassins club.  Maybe not happy - that made it sound like he was glad Barnes had been tortured for seven decades. Or however long he’d been out of the Cryotube in that time. Relieved? Something. Clint felt  _ something _ about the fact that there was no more Winter Soldier.

 

Except, of course, there  _ was _ still a - the? - Winter Soldier.

 

Cap brought Bucky home like he’d adopted a puppy from the pound, stood there fucking grinning while Wanda checked him over and confirmed that, yeah, whatever science the Wakandas had done, had removed the triggers from Bucky’s head. He put one massive, patriotic hand on Bucky’s shoulder and said that they were  _ both _ ready to join/rejoin the Avengers.

 

And then Cap had turned to Tony, and they’d both cried, and they’d hugged, and everyone had looked away, and of course Clint had had the bad luck to find himself looking at fucking Bucky.

 

He knew about the Winter Soldier - as a budding assassin, he’d worshipped the myth of the man who left no trace of himself and made impossible shots. As Natasha’s partner years later, he’d been at her bedside when she woke up from surgery after the Odessa clusterfuck. He’d listened to her talk about being trained by him as a child and an adolescent, had listened to her fight back tears and her anger and her fears. 

 

And he’d seen the footage of the clusterfuck in DC.

 

So he  _ knew _ what Bucky looked like. Knew what the Bucky of 1945 had looked like, knew what the Bucky of 2014 looked like.

 

And he looked, quite fucking unfairly,  _ good _ .

 

With the eyes and the hair and the jaw and the goddamn  _ eye crinkles _ .

 

And then Bucky went and fucking  _ smirked _ at Clint. While Cap cried on Tony’s shoulder and everyone else stared off into space and wondered how the fuck things had come to this, Bucky fucking smirked at him.

 

So, yeah.

 

Clint had been  _ fucking fine _ . Until Bucky.

 

And his damn smirks.

 

He was  _ everywhere _ .

 

In the gym. Smirking at Clint.

 

On the range. Smirking at Clint.

 

In the med bay. Smirking at Clint.

 

On the Quinjet. Smirking at Clint.

 

Shooting sentient slug monsters. Smirking at Clint.

 

Dancing with Nat at Tony’s wedding. Smirking at Clint.

 

So Clint did what he did best, and he avoided the shit out of  _ why _ it bothered Clint so much when Bucky smirked at him. 

 

He started avoiding the gym.

 

He started avoiding the range.

 

He… failed to avoid the med bay. 

 

He told Cap to put him on a different mission rotation.

 

So no more smirking on the Quinjet.

 

No more smirking while shooting sentient slug monsters.

 

And it wasn’t like anyone else on the team was getting married anytime soon, so no more… smirking while dancing in a fitted tuxedo and looking like a goddamn matinee idol from the last century.

 

Clint was so good at avoiding the smirking that it was six months before he realized how fucking  _ miserable _ he was.

 

And he only realized it  _ then _ , because he was at a dive bar in Brooklyn, watching a Yankees game on the miniscule television screen above the bar, drinking a shitty local beer that was hoppy as all hell, and a guy sat down next to him and started to flirt with him.

 

Clint got it. He did. 

 

He was an Avenger. He was a fit guy. He wasn’t  _ ugly _ . He was, by a lot of people’s standards, decently attractive. But that was only because people didn’t know he was an absolute fucking  _ mess _ . Like, nuclear waste-site levels of radioactive  _ mess _ .

 

So a guy sat down beside Clint, offered to buy him another shitty beer, gave him a look that was pretty much a leer, and said he wanted to  _ thank _ his favorite Avenger.

 

Clint did what he did best.

 

He finished off his current shitty beer, and turned to look at the guy full-on.

 

The guy had the eyes and the hair and the jaw, and they were  _ almost _ what Clint wanted. 

 

“Am I your favorite Avenger because I’m the one who almost got New York nuked by the World Security Council, or because I’m the only one you figure you’ve got a chance of nailing?”

 

And the thing about Clint?

 

He never missed.

 

So the guy was scrambling awkwardly away and leaving Clint alone before Clint even realized there was someone standing behind him.

 

Someone who  _ did _ have the eyes and the hair and the jaw and the  _ goddamn _ eye crinkles.

 

“What the fuck are you doing here?” 

 

It wasn’t, probably, the most eloquent greeting ever, but Clint wasn’t much of a poet.

 

Bucky just fucking smirked, and sat down on the seat so recently and rapidly vacated by the last guy. 

 

He raised a finger to get the bartender’s attention, signalled at Clint’s bottle and held up two fingers, and Clint had to grimace when two more shitty beers were deposited on the counter.

 

Bucky’s smirk slid into his own grimace as he took a sip of his beer.

 

“This tastes like shit.”

 

“Welcome to the future. Where every goddamn corner of Brooklyn has a brewery, and every hipster thinks all you need to make beer is hops.  _ All the fucking hops _ .”

 

Bucky set down his beer bottle and turned towards Clint.

 

And Clint realized, all of a sudden and way too late, just how close Bucky was to him.

 

Close enough for their knees to touch.

 

Close enough for Clint to see the scar along the right side of Bucky’s jaw that Nat had apparently given him when she was thirteen and Bucky had been training her in the Red Room. Close enough to see the flecks of blue in his gray eyes.

 

“So, if I told you that you were my favorite Avenger, would you try to scare me off too?” Bucky asked with another smirk.

 

Clint stared at him.

 

Bucky kept smirking.

 

“Oh, fuck off,” Clint growled. Because it was one thing for random assholes to make the mistake of being attracted to Clint. It was entirely another for a teammate, for the object of Clint’s unacknowledged desires, to sit there and taunt him.

 

“Not scary enough. I was tortured by HYDRA for  _ decades _ ,” Bucky muttered. “You really want to get rid of me, you’re gonna have to put some effort into it.”

 

Clint glared.

 

Bucky kept fucking smirking.

 

“What the fuck is your  _ deal _ ?” Clint finally asked, knowing he sounded whiny. Because he  _ was _ whining.

 

Bucky lifted his eyebrows.

 

“With the-” Clint gestured at Bucky, then at himself. “What the fuck?”

 

“I have absolutely no idea what you’re asking me,” Bucky said, and he sounded amused.

 

Which, fine. Clint had had people laugh at him before.

 

It was fine.

 

Clint was  _ fine _ .

 

“Mind if I ask you a question?” Bucky asked, smoothing his metal thumb over the label of his shitty beer.

 

“Knock yourself out,” Clint sighed.

 

“Why’ve you been avoiding me for the last six months?”

 

Clint could deny. He could claim that he hadn’t been avoiding Bucky.

 

But he had been. And they both knew it.

 

“Because,” he grumbled.

 

“Ah. Gotcha.” Bucky was back to fucking smirking. “Same, pal.”

 

Clint rolled his eyes and- 

 

And fuck it.

 

_ Fuck. It. _

 

He glared at Bucky until the smirk slipped away.

 

“I was  _ fine _ until you showed up here,” Clint said. Hissed, really. “I was managing shit, okay? And then you- you just- walk around  _ smirking, _ and you make me want all of these fucking things that I don’t get to  _ have _ . You just- You can’t just- I  _ have _ to avoid you, you asshole.”

 

Bucky’s eyebrows pulled together as he frowned, full lips curving down.

 

But then his expression smoothed out, and he reached over with both hands, metal and flesh, and framed Clint’s face between his palms.

 

“Sweetheart, you get to have whatever you  _ want _ . Anyone who says different is a stupid asshole. And if you,” Bucky paused, drew in an unsteady breath and licked his lower lip, “if you want me, hell, if you want  _ anything _ to do with me, then I’m yours.”

 

Clint doesn’t know what to do. What to say. What to fucking  _ feel _ . 

 

Because Bucky is looking at him like  _ Clint _ is someone he wants, like Clint is someone who matters. Like Clint is someone worth having.

 

Bucky smoothed his metal thumb over Clint’s cheek.

 

“Say something. Or punch me, if you want,” Bucky tacked on when Clint still remained frozen.

 

“Pizza.”

 

Bucky’s face moved through a riot of expressions - confusion, annoyance, concern, sadness - before smoothing back out into what Clint considered was his  _ mission ready smirk _ .

 

“We should get some. Pizza.” Clint realized he needed to say more words.

 

Bucky’s face relaxed.

 

“Yeah. We should. Pizza.”

 

Bucky let him go, and Clint immediately wished they could just sit there with Bucky’s hands on his face all night.

 

Clint dug into his pocket, paid for their drinks, and then stepped away from the bar.

 

Bucky held out his right hand.

 

Clint stared at Bucky, then at his hand.

 

Bucky smirked at him.

 

Clint slipped his hand into Bucky’s.

 

And it was fine.

 

He was  _ fine _ .

 

He was so much fucking more than fine.


End file.
